Dive
by Astrid
Summary: PreRENT fic dealing with Roger's addiction. Rated PG-13 for some language. Dedicated to the Princess.


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A/N: _This is my first Roger fic posted here. Hopefully it lives up to the expectations set by the Princess. Oh yeah, I own nothing, Larson owns everything. Feel free to tear it apart, I love criticism._

I'm just standing here. Lost, and feeling and not wanting to feel. Wanting that numbness. Wanting to stop feeling so fucking miserable. Wanting to stop noticing the holes where April used to be, spaces she used to fill. I expect her to say things in certain places, or correct my English or just be there when I turn around and I do and there's...

Nothing.

Not a trace of her, not a vague scent of her. The only thing that's there is a pile of her old stuff that we're giving to goodwill.

Mark stands next to me, removing the tie that literally looked like it was choking him through the whole service, and just being too quiet. The silence is allowing me to think. Thinking isn't something I want to do. I'll think about her. 

I move. I walk the six or seven paces it is from the loft door to my room _(our room)_ and sit heavily on the bed. God, how could this happen to me, to her, to us, to this, to now, to forever? My head in my hands, I close my eyes. And then I open them and find myself staring at my wrists. My veins. April always had good veins, easy to find, thin skin. I'd kill to have veins like hers. I'd kill to be able to go back and plug them up when they were seeping the life out of her into our bathtub.

She left me. She left me half a tank of gas and a full stash. And needles. I threw hers away but I still have mine. I still have all of mine. I think there's one full in there now, one I prepped about 10 minutes ago while Mark was downstairs getting the mail. Her name was on a few bills. I had to shove it in my top drawer because he came up the stairs, slowly, lethargically, like he was the one dying. He is not the one dying.

I told him I was done. But I'm not done. 

There's no way I can handle this alone.

_You're not alone, Roger, Mark's right out there._

There's no way I can handle this *alone*.

I pull open the top drawer and there it is. A welcome sign into oblivion. Just one push and this all goes away for a few hours and a few hours is better than never. It's like swimming, you hold your breath and you close your eyes and you just dive. Dive. Diving is not like swimming. You can dive and sink. You can sink so far you can't see the top. You can dive and forget to swim.

I want to sink. 

So I start to dive, I ready myself on the board and all it'll take is one plunge and one push and I'm gone. Faster than lightning. I'll speed through this.

He materializes in the doorway, his observant little eyes aflame. Yeah, yeah, I told you I was done, and you caught me, but can you stop me, filmmaker?

He can stop me. And he does. He takes my escape, sharp and gleaming, away and he holds it, looking at it like it was some sort of creature that over took me whenever I used it.

"Does it really make things better?"

"Yeah."

"Do you really just stop feeling?"

"Yeah." Go ahead, where's the clincher, where's the punch line to this eternal fucking joke?

"So if I use this, I'll stop loving her too?" 

No. 

He offers it back to me. He holds it carefully in the palm of his hand and offers it back to me. His eyes tell me he won't be angry if I take it. His shaking hand tells me he'll be petrified.

With one burst I pull my arm up and swat the bottom of his hand, sending it flying. It smashes into a million little pieces against the opposite wall. His hand is still outstretched. Slowly, his fingers curl and his hand slumps back to his side.

"You're done, Roger. Where's the rest." The last sentence he says to me isn't a question. It's a demand. Before I know it we're tearing apart my room, trashing uppers, downers, smack, dust, alcohol, anything. I give him everything. Christ, the kid even takes my cigarettes and breaks them. I'm done, I'm really done.

Because I can't dive anymore. I have no more breath in me to hold. I have no more strength to jump. I don't have the memory of swimming. And I don't have her to save me if I start to drown.


End file.
